CONCERTO GROSSO PER I NEW TROLLS

One of the major bands that jump started the Italian progressive rock scene, NEW TROLLS debuted as early as 1967 and the following year released the nation's very first concept album in the rock paradigm. While the album wasn't exactly firing on all prog cylinders yet, the band formed by guitarist / vocalist Vittorio de Scalzi, vocalist / guitarist Nico Di Palo, keyboardist Mauro Chiarugi, bassist Giorgio D'Adamo and drummer Gianni Belleno spent the next few years releasing singles but not albums primarily due to the fact the album concept hadn't quite caught on in Italy yet. Therefore NEW TROLLS released a compilation of non-album singles in the form of an eponymous release in 1970 before keyboardist Mauro Chiarugi jumped shipped and was replaced by classically trained Maurizio Salvi which would mark a remarkable shift in the band's direction.

In 1971 the band unleashed its most famous release CONCERTO GROSSO PER I NEW TROLLS which was basically ground zero for the classically infused Italian prog that exploded onto the scene soon thereafter. The music on the album was written by Luis Enriquez Bacalov, the Argentine film score composer who collaborated with a number of Italian bands during the early 70s prog boom. Fortified with orchestral arrangements and ambitious musical workouts, NEW TROLLS adopted the symphonic aspects of The Moody Blues along with the rock infused energy of The Nice and delivered one of Italy's most famous classical crossover rock albums of the era and one that announced to a nation still suffering from a 60s beat hangover that the times have a-changed and that the wild prog 70s had arrived.

The album featured two long tracks that filled each side of the original vinyl edition. The opening title track featured four suites ranging from a violin led orchestra introducing the show on "Allegro" and continues with dreamy vocal led progressive rock on "Adagio." "Cadenza" provides a haunting mood setting with a frenetic violin solo whereas it all ends with "Shadows (per Hendrix)" which displays a more acid rock heavy psych approach complete with an unhinged guitar freak out at the end. Throughout it all are elements of folk music with Jethro Tull-like flute performances and although the band had graduated to full-blown prog, the beat aspects in the drumming pattern still found their way into the mix. This was very much a transitional album from the 60s psychedelic rock trends to the wild and fully developed prog that bands like PFM, Banco and Il Balletto di Bronzo would deliver the following year.

The second side is a NEW TROLLS composition and features the 20 1/2 minute "Nella Sala Vuota, Improvvisazioni Dei New Trolls Registrate In Diretta" which is the cream of the crop on the album as it pushes the prog rock characteristics even further with a series of cadences and motifs that morph and offer basically what amounts to songs within songs. The keyboard performances are feistier as is the rock guitar, bass and drum rhythmic drive. On this one the band delivers a reckless abandon and simply goes for it as opposed to the more structured and reserved compositional flow of the A-side. Side B offered more exploration in meandering through various moods with shifting dynamics and a greater emphasis on soloing. While the keyboard excursions are pleasant i could live without the seven minute drum solo at the end though. Luckily the track resolves itself with a feisty band performance ending that matches the intensity of the drummer.

Sure this isn't the best prog album of the 70s but it surely is one of the most historically relevant and it's also fairly unique sounding as it perfectly capture that in-between stage between the psych-fueled 60s and the unleashed prog excesses that would very quickly follow. The musicians perform all the movements perfectly and although there is some downtime here and there which keeps the album from being perfect, nothing is so bad that it's not listenable. Much of the album is the perfect mix of classical and rock and for a rough draft of Italian prog so to speak, it's actually a brilliantly designed album. Excellent Hammond organ work, dynamic flute and guitar parts, more than competent drumming with Nico Di Palo's vocal style passionately delivering high register operatic walloping wails.